Packing containers

ABSTRACT

A packaging container which is constructed from a blank by folding the blank twice and glueing together the overlapped edges, and erecting the blank to tubular form by pushing the folds together, the blank having creases which lie helically of the tube and about which the blank folds in erecting step. The erected container preferably has end portions which extend axially of the container, and which are joined by the helically extending creases.

United States Patent 1191 May Oct. 14, 1975 PACKING CONTAINERS 3,079,062 2/1963 Craddock et a1. 229 22 x 3 l ,809 5 l d 22 8 [75] Inventor: Edward Gordon May, Gildersome, 31 l 964 Ru es 9/ X near Leeds, England FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS [73] Assignee: J hn Waddington Li nited, England 519,577 4/1940 United Kingdom 229/8 716,692 10/1954 United Kingdom 229/37 R Filed: y 29, 1974 942,748 11/1963 United Kingdom... pp 492 519 966,033 8/1964 United Kingdom 229/8 Related Application Data Primary ExaminerDavis T Moorhead [63] (ljg l-iginutatiodn-in-( jpart of Ser. No. 322,916, Jan. 12, Attorney Agent, or Firm Bierman & Bierman a an one 1 [30] Foreign Application Priority Data 57 ABSTRACT May 25, 1971 United Kingdom 17082/71 A packagIng container whIch Is constructed from a 2 1974 U KI .1 559 74 June mted ngdom 27 blank by folding the blank twice and glueing together the overlapped edges and erecting the blank to tubu- 52 US. Cl 229 37 R' 229 8, 229 41 R E Int Cl 2 l B65D/ 5/02 lar form by pushmg the folds together, the blank hav- [58] Fieid 8 37 R ing creases which lie helically of the tube and about 1 1 which the blank folds in erecting step. The erected container preferably has end portions which extend [56] References Cited axially of the container, and which are joined by the UNITED STATES PATENTS helically extending creases.

1,831,537 1 1/1931 McCune 229/37 R 10 Claims, 7 Drawing Figures US. Patent Oct. 14, 1975 Sieet 1 of2 3,912,156

Sheet 2 of2 3,912,156

US. Patent Oct. 14, 1975 PACKING CONTAINERS BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION This invention relates to packaging containers and blanks therefor, and is a continuation-in-part of my application Ser. No. 322,916, filed Jan. 12, 1973 now abandoned, which claims the priorty of United Kingdom applications 17,082 and 27,559 filed May 25, 1971 and June 21, 1974, respectively.

DISCUSSION OF THE PRIOR ART At present, there is an ever increasing demand for packaging containers which are of novel and aesthetically pleasing appearance, and many containers have been designed for these purposes. Sometimes, the novelty of design will be simply in the colouring or pattern of the package, but in other cases, attempts have been made to change and enhance the appearance of packaging containers. Many of these attempts have been successful, but many bring new problems, which are inherent in the novelty of the construction involved.

This invention is principally concerned with tubular packaging containers, and a principle object is to provide a tubular packaging container which has at least a section thereof which has the appearance of an axially twisting article.

It is already known to provide a tubular packaging container in which the tube has the appearance of being helically twisted from end to end. This container is produced by taking a rhomboidal shaped blank, by making a plurality of spaced crease lines on the blank which are parallel to each other and to a pair of the sides of the blank, and then by manually forcing the blank into tube form by arranging together and securing together the opposite sides to which said plurality of crease lines are parallel. In this erection step twisting strains are placed upon the blank which causes the blank to fold about said parallel crease lines, and such crease lines naturally fall into helical disposition relative to the axis of the completed containers.

Because heavy twisting stresses are imposed upon the blank during the erecting step, the formation of these blanks into the tubular containers is far more difficult than meets the eye, and indeed these blanks have not been brought with commercial use because of the difficulty of erecting the blanks. Even if machinery were capable of erecting the blanks in the manner outlined above, in all probability it would operate all too slowly to make it commercially acceptable. It is very significant that the known twisted hexagon tube referred to above was disclosed in a document available for public inspection in 1940, but to date the tubular container has found no commercial success.

The known helical container also has another drawback that because the helical comers or creases run from end to end of the container, the fitting of rigid end caps presents a difficulty, in that, whilst the cap can easily be fabricated to the cross-sectional shape of the container end, it is not easy to fabricate the cap comers to follow the helical pattern of the container creases.

OBJECTIVES OF THE INVENTION A final objective of this invention is to provide a con- A further objective is to provide a one-piece which is readily erectible into a container according to the invention.

These and other objectives will become more apparent as the description of the invention proceeds with reference to the accompanying drawings.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The main objective of the invention is achieved in that the blank from which the container is to be erected has two crease lines about which the blank is folded or that edges of the blank overlap and a flattened sleeve is formed. The container preferably is made up of two end sections having Axial corners, which are connected by a centre section having the helical corners.

By arranging that the blank is first of all folded to flat sleeve form, it is ensured that the blank can be erected by high speed in-line folding glueing and erecting machinery. Furthermore,'by providing that the ends of the container have axially extending corners the fitting of the rigid end caps, of a similar construction is simplified.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1. is a plan view of a blank according to the present invention;

FIG. 2. is a perspective view of the blank of FIG. 1, after the folding thereof;

FIG. 3. is a perspective view of the flattened sleeve formed by folding the blank of FIG. 1;

FIG. 4. is a perspective view of the casing erected from the flattened sleeve of FIG. 3;

FIG. 5. is a plan view of a blank according to a second embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 6. is a perspective view of a packaging container constructed from the blank of FIG. 5; and

FIG. 7. is a sectional elevation of one end of the container of FIG. 7.

DESCRIPTION OF THE SPECIFIC EMBODIMENTS Referring now to the drawings, the first to FIG. 1, it will be seen that the blank 10 is generally rectangular, except for a glue tab 12 on one of the shorter edges 14 thereof. Edge 14 is a fold line.

The longer edges 16 and 18 of the blank are each divided into six equal portions which form the sides of a hexagonal end defined when the blank is constructed into the casing according to the embodiment of the invention. Such division is formed by fold lines 16A and 18A which extend inwardly of the blank and are parallel to the shorter edges of the blank. The fold lines 16A are in alignment witih fold lines 18A, but are joined to the fold lines 18A by inclined fold lines 20. The blank is thus formed into five identical panels, each comprising end portions and an intermediate portion, the end portions having edges which are parallel to the shorter edges of the blank, and the intermediate portions having edges which are parallel, but are inclined relative to the shorter edges of the blank as shown, and two half panel portions 22 which are identical and together make up a panel similar to the five idential panels already described.

Additionally, the centre fold line 16A is joined to the centre fold line 18A with which it is aligned, by a fold line 24 which is parallel to fold line 14. Thus, apart from fold line 14, fold line 24 bisects the blank into two identical halves.

Additionally, the glue flap 14 has a short inclined fold line 26 which in the erected casing is superimposed on fold line 20 at the opposite shorter edge of the blank, as will be explained.

In order to construct the casing according to the embodiment from the blank described, initially the glue flap 12 is folded over to the position shown in FIG. 2 an indicated by arrow 27, and then the blank is folded about fold line 24 and the extensions 18A and 16A thereof, as indicated by arrow 28 in FIG. 2, until the free edge of the folded over half of the blank is superimposed, and glued to the folded over glue flap 12. The blank is now in the condition of a flattened sleeve, in which form it is suitable for transportation to the place where the casing will be filled with the contents it is to hold. Erection of the flattened, sleeve like blank into the form shown in FIG. 4, is effected simply by pushing together the edges of the sleeve as indicated by arrows 30 in FIG. 3. This causes the sleeve ends to take up the hexagonal form shown in FIG. 4, and more particularly causes the blank to fold about fold lines 20, to give the container the appearance of being helically twisted between the ends. The degree of twist involved can be considered in this example to be 60, because of each side of each end of the casing, this connects with a side at the other end of the casing, which is displaced by 60 from the first mentioned side.

It is to be appreciated that the container can be constructed so that the ends have more or lesssides than 6 as illustrated in the example of FIGS. 1 to 4. Furthermore, the amount of helical twist can be varied by connecting side portions of one end with side portions of the other end which are further angularly displaced than merely by one pitch.

The blank may be provided with suitable end flap formations, for providing ends for the erected container, but in the example illustrated in FIGS. 1 to 4, this packaging container is particularly suitable for use with rigid plastic hexaginal ends, and such ends would be a push fit in the container ends, and would overlap those axial portions of the container defined by the fold lines 16A and 18A, but would not extend to the helically twisted portion, and therefore would not have to be specifically fabricated to suit the helically twisted portion.

Referring now to the embodiment of the invention illustrated in FIGS. 5, 6 and 7, the blank shown in FIG. is basically similar to that shown in FIG. 1, but in this case the six panel ends at one end of the blank are connected to the six panel ends at the other end of the blank, but angularly displaced by the width of two ends. Therefore the amount of twist imparted to the final tube is 120. Furthermore the crease lines 30 are in fact made to follow a uniformally accelerated helical path between the end regions, and at the end regions the crease lines 30 come into axial positions parallel to the edges of the blank. Each of the end panels is provided with a fold over tab 32 as shown, and the two fold lines about which the blank is folded initially in the erection process are indicated by numerals 34 and 36. The blank is provided with glue tab 38 as in the previous embodiment. The manner of erecting the blank in FIG. 5 is exactly the same as that described in relation to FIGS. 1 to 4, and the blank naturally folds about the crease lines 30 to give the appearance of the container shown in FIG. 6, when the flattened sleeve blank is pushed on edges 36 and 34 in a manner to bring these edges closer together.

FIG. 7 shows how the tuck-in flaps 32, which are glued to the associated panels on the insides thereof, can be used for the retention of the rigid plastic material cap 38, shown in dotted lines in FIG. 7. A lower ridge 40 on the cap catches on the undersides of the tuck-in flaps 32, which therefore retain the cap in position until manually removed by springing the rim 40 past the flaps 32. As the crease lines 30 flow axially to the ends of the container, then no special formation of cap is required to match the helical corners formed by the crease lines 30 in the erected container.

The containers and blanks according to the invention as described, have the advantage of novel appearance, without the disadvantages of difficulties in erection. The effect of twisting the comers in the tube is to increase the rigidity of the tube, and the provision of the axial end portions to the container enables the use of rigid end caps if desired.

The containers may be printed in any suitable manner, and while they will normally be constructed from paper board material, it is possible to construct the blanks and containers from other material such as synthetic plastic sheeting.

It is to be appreciated that the container may have a cross sectional shape other than the hexagonal form shown in each of the examples. An octagonal container could be constructed on similar principals.

I claim:

I. A tubular packaging container which is constructed from a blank having two forming creases about which the blank can be folded into flattened sleeve form with the free edges overlapping and secured together, the container being erected by a pushing together of the folded edges of the flattened sleeve, said blank having crease lines which are inclined relative to the length direction of the sleeve so that in erecting the container the blank folds about said inclined crease lines which define comers extending helically of the container, giving the container a twisted helical appearance over at least part of its length.

2. A tubular packaging container according to claim 1, wherein the container is of constant cross-section, and such section is multi-sided.

3. A tubular package according to claim 2, wherein the corners of the container extend axially from one end, then extend helically of the container, and again extend axially of the container at the other end of the container.

4. A tubular container according to claim 3, wherein the comers of the container at one end are aligned with the corners at the other end of the container.

5. A tubular container according to claim 4, wherein the said forming creases lie on aligned corners of the container.

6. A tubular container according to claim 5, wherein the panels of the container between the corners connect and edges which are angularly displaced by 160 relative to the axis of the containers.

7. A tubular container according to claim 5, wherein the panels of the container between the comers connect and edges which are angularly displaced by relative to the axis of the containers.

8. A container according to claim 7, wherein the corners define uniformly accelerated helical paths.

9. A tubular container according to claim 2, wherein the container is of hexagonal cross section.

10. A tubular container according to claim 5,

wherein at each end of the container there are tuck-in flaps which are adhered to the inside of the container and define a ledge for the retention of a closure cap having a retention rim adapted to engage under the ledge. 

1. A tubular packaging container which is constructed from a blank having two forming creases about which the blank can be folded into flattened sleeve form with the free edges overlapping and secured together, the container being erected by a pushing together of the folded edges of the flattened sleeve, said blank having crease lines which are inclined relative to the length direction of the sleeve so that in erecting the container the blank folds about said inclined crease lines which define corners extending helically of the container, giving the container a twisted helical appearance over at least part of its length.
 2. A tubular packaging container according to claim 1, wherein the container is of constant cross-section, and such section is multi-sided.
 3. A tubular package according to claim 2, wherein the corners of the container extend axially from one end, then extend helically of the container, and again extend axially of the container at the other end of the container.
 4. A tubular container according to claim 3, wherein the corners of the container at one end are aligned with the corners at the other end of the container.
 5. A tubular container according to claim 4, wherein the said forming creases lie on aligned corners of the container.
 6. A tubular container according to claim 5, wherein the panels of the container between the corners connect and edges which are angularly displaced by 160* relative to the axis of the containers.
 7. A tubular container according to claim 5, wherein the panels of the container between the corners connect and edges which are angularly displaced by 120* relative to the axis of the containers.
 8. A container according to claim 7, wherein the corners define uniformly accelerated helical paths.
 9. A tubular container according to claim 2, wherein the container is of hexagonal cross section.
 10. A tubular container according to claim 5, wherein at each end of the container there are tuck-in flaps which are adhered to the inside of the container and define a ledge for the retention of a closure cap having a retention rim adapted to engage under the ledge. 